Amazon and My New Swamp Lizard!

by J. Money on Tuesday, November 20, 2012

How’s THAT for a title? ;) And luckily the tool I wanna share with y’all today is just as juicy too! At least with the way I operate my Amazon addiction… I swear it seems I buy EVERYTHING there now – remember when it was only about books? (Or am I dating myself there? Haha…)

If you pay for Amazon Prime, then this won’t apply to you much, but for those frugal bastards who don’t like paying more for things when you can get them cheaper, especially since half the time the items come within 2-3 days anyways, this article today is for you.

I was on the phone with a friend of mine trying to figure out if launching a thrift store finder site would be a good idea or not (I later found out there was already a big one that owns the market: The Thrift Shopper, though I still think it would be fun…), and at some point our conversation turned to other online tools we like and use all the time ourselves. Places like Outright.com for me – which automatically handles all my business income/expenses/etc which will SAVE my ass during tax season – and a place called FillerItem.com for him. Which today’s post is all about.

You know how you always need to hit $25.00 in items to qualify for Amazon’s Free “Super Saver Shipping?” But of course you never buy enough to actually HIT IT so you go searching around for something to make up the difference, and only end up spending more in the end? For something you didn’t even care about to begin with? Well, this site helps you with that :)

All you do is basically just type in the dollar amount you need left to reach that $25.00 mark ($1.78, $3.00, $0.12, etc), and out will come a list of alllll the items they sell that reach those parameters! Most times dead on with the amounts, and others a handful of pennies more. But all of them help you to use your money more efficiently. And the items that are more popular get bolded over the ones that aren’t, and then the SUPER popular ones come with a tiny pic attached too.

Admittedly it’s not the most beautifully designed site in the world, what with its text links all over the place, but who really cares when you’re there to complete your mission? To be honest I’m just pissed I never thought of it first myself! Haha… It woulda been full of pretty little thumbnail images instead so you can choose your items a lot quicker ;) But who am I to be picky?

At any rate, earlier this week when I was checking out and realized I was short $0.87 without any more items to buy (I usually just throw things in my cart until I reach $25.00, but sometimes it can take forever), I decided to give this a chance and see how it works in practice… And I fell in love!

I clicked right on over, entered my $0.87 that I needed, and it spit out over 200+ links one after another for me to choose from. Which I then scrolled through until something interesting caught my eye. Something that had a cool enough name that had nothing to do with “steel pipe fittings” or “Walton replacement fingers” (what the heck are those?).

Here’s a snapshot of the first few items that popped out: (And yes, you can see I was curious about those nipple things! Haha… Nothing interesting there, I can assure you ;))

Eventually something DID pique my interest, though, and it’s title was simply, “Swamp Lizard.” No description, no measurements, just plain ol’ Swamp Lizard. I was both intrigued and curious as to what kind of reptile this could be for a mere 87 cents :) But boy did I have it wrong – the thing ended up being a KNIFE! A pretty slick looking one too! Haha.. I was sold. What guy doesn’t like knives?

Now, granted you could say these are all things you truly don’t *need*, and thus you’re still stuck in that same position of picking up junk just to get your free shipping, BUT – and this is a big but – even if it were junk, the fact is you’re still saving on all that ADDITIONAL money you would have spent anyways over the $25.00! So if you waste $.87 instead of $5.87 – Awesome! And even better if you can actually use the add-on item too – something that shouldn’t be that hard to do anyways considering there’s like 200+ items to choose from when you search.

So needless to say I’m a pretty happy blogger right now :) Not only do I have a kick-ass knife that I’ll probably put in my wife’s glove compartment to use in case of an emergency (or maybe my own?), but I also now have a killer site to use for the next time(s) I get stuck again too! Nothing like a simple idea to make your life a lot easier going forward…

Y’all should give it a shot too the next time you’re stuck in free shipping limbo :) If you don’t like any of the random items you find, you can always give them to someone else as stocking stuffers! Haha… That would be hilarious… You should do that.

NICE! I always HATE it when it come up just short of being eligible for the free shipping. I’m sure the picture makes the knife look bigger than it really is, but all I could think of is the line from Crocodile Dundee (I’m dating myself BIG TIME)….”Now THAT’S a knife!” Hahaha!

Go on Swamp Lizard, make my day! Ha ha, love it. And love FillerItem already – though I do actually use Amazon Prime! I found the annual cost is less than buying new things to reach the free delivery mark, which was what I was doing before. But hey, I missed out on owning a Swamp Lizard as a result – boo! Got a feeling, J Money, that Swampy sales are set to soar!

I’ll have to suggest this to my mom who doesn’t like paying for prime. I actually do love prime, but I registered back when I was a student so I got a year free and I’m in my second year of four half-price discount years. (If you have a student email – whether you’ve graduated or not, you should definitely register!) So for $39, I definitely get my moneys worth – especially with the free kindle book a month. Maybe when the price goes up, I’ll drop the prime and start using this.

That’s a pretty slick site. Personally I get angry at amazon a lot, mostly because they have TWO warehouses within 30 minutes of my house and 99% of what I buy comes from them and still takes forever to get to me. I wish they would do an inperson pick up (which I have heard they are considering) and I would pretty much stop shopping anywhere else.

I don’t buy a lot at Amazon, but then again, I don’t do a lot of online shopping either. Or offline shopping, other than food. I’m a frugal SOB, I guess. But half the time when I am buying something on Amazon, I’m in this predicament. I’m usually about $5 short.

The picture of that swamp lizard got my attention – I collect knives, most of them from Amazon, but occasionally from eBay. As far as filler items, I may look at that site next time I’m short of $25, but what I usually do is go to my wishlist or order history. I re-order certain grocery items regularly, and don’t mind having extra on hand if that’s what I have to do for free shipping. California sales tax immediately curbed my Amazon shopping, so it turned out to be another way to save money :)

Sounds interesting, but I usually just hit “save for later” in the shopping cart. Then when I want something else I get the free shipping. I usually don’t need that much extra crap that I can’t wait until I need something else. Besides, I do a survey program that gives me a $10 gift card to Amazon every month, so I usually have to wait until I accumulate those at the same time.

@William @ Drop Dead Money – I know, right? Such an easy and HELPFUL idea!
@Travis @DebtChronicles – Haha… I actually thought it was gonna be pretty small myself, but it just came in the mail and it’s actually big! I was shocked.
@Lance @ Money Life and More – That’s what I’m saying… If you need something SUPER fast for whatever reason, either go out and buy it yourself in person or just pay for faster shipping in that one instance, ya know? I’m not that impatient.
@Slackerjo – AWESOME!!! I love that so much :) And totally gonna Tweet it and include it in my next link roundup too – thanks friend! And crazy it’s in my ‘hood of DC too, jeez.
@Skint in the City – Haha… yeah right. Watch this post completely sell out all Swamp Lizards and it becomes the next “big thing” ;) Ya never know? Hope things are well for you across the pond, friend!
@SMB – There you go! My wife actually has Prime too since she’s a student, but I can never use it cuz I always want to use my Amazon credit and you can’t xfer it out to anyone! Arghh… but at least it’s all free credit ;)
@Brian – Wow, that’s pretty cool! I hope they DO start that then for you, man… that would be great! They’re out in the NYC/New Jersey area yeah? I swear I pass one of their huge warehouses when I drive to the city.
@Edward Antrobus – Haha… there’s nothing wrong with being a frugal SOB ;)
@L Bee and the Money Tree – Love you too!
@savvyfinanciallatina – Glad you like it! Try it out the next time and see what you come across :)
@Yana – Ahhh there you go, that’s a good idea… I guess we can do that with baby diapers and what not too since we always need more, but it’s just not as fun now w/ this website I found, haha… Great idea though!
@Financial Black Sheep – That’s usually what I do too, but after a couple of weeks I lose patience and want to hurry up and complete the order :)

Thank you so much for sharing this! Those little extra pennies keeping one from free shipping are highly irksome.

I can see how playing with this tool could get addictive. I just did a few random searches, and the results are as amazing as you say. But what to choose? Fun with Jurassic Dinosaurs stencils? 2 dozen #1 pencils? Build your Own Cupcake sticker set? Steelon Leaders? The Twilight Zone volume 4? The Precious Blood of Jesus? (Which, for $1.50, I have to assume is a book or some kind and not, you know, a relic.)

This would be no where near as much fun if there were pictures. The list of totally random items is delightful.

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